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Berkeley City College
Roundtable Minutes
Monday, December 10, 2012
Chair: Debbie Budd, Interim President
Attendees:Fabian Banga, Linda Berry, Joseph Bielanski, May Chen, Denise Jennings, Brenda Johnson, Linda McAllister, Cleavon Smith, Pieter de Haan, Trieveon Cooper, Hoa Luong, Scott Hoshida, Hayley Laity, Amora Brown, Lee Marrs, Barbara Des Rochers
Dr. Budd reviewed the agenda and the stated the goal of spending time on the accreditation report. We will do a quick review of highlights and successes and review the draft for the priorities.
Discussion and Review of Recommendation 5 for ACCJC Follow-up report
Summary of the accreditation process
Ideally a college is visited for a full accreditation self-study every six years. The goal of the self-study is to look at what we are doing; how we are ensuring student success and that learning is occurring; and ensuring that our planning drives our resource allocation and we have data-driven decision making. And that we use the data and information to make decisions. Our last full self -study was in Spring 2009.
When we were visited in 2009 they looked at what was happening at BCC and said we were doing great work and we are reaffirming your accreditation. When they were here they looked at information across the district and at the district service center and found that we had a couple of issues in our budget and finance. We then received a letter in November that said after looking at the audit and other issues, we are going to come back to visit Peralta. The letter was so strongly worded that when we responded, there was concern at the back of our minds that we could have been placed on Show Cause. When they visited they said we had issues and were put on Probation, which is not as bad as Show Cause. Last spring when they came we had hope we would be taken off sanction. We are on Warning. When they come in the spring to look at us they want us to respond exactly to what they have identified that we have to respond to. Our response is Commission Recommendation 5.
What we are looking at today is just what they have asked us to respond to in Recommendation 5. It is not to go in depth to what people have wrote about in the program review and this isn’t a planning document. This is looking at the planning we have done and highlighting our strengths for accreditation.
Dr. Joseph Bielanski added that the purpose of the report is to say that we do meet the standards. It doesn’t necessarily exceed them, or that we go over and beyond. The real focus is to say to the commission and to the team that comes that we do meet the standards and then to show how we meet them. The visiting team is not here to help us. Their role is to say we either meet the standards or we don’t. He encouraged everyone to stick with the focus of how we meet the standard, at get Berkeley City College off of Warning.
The Focus of Our Response
“The colleges’ responses in the upcoming Follow-Up Reports should include an analysis of staff sufficiency and the quality of educational programs and services before and after budget reductions with sufficient detail and evidence to evaluate the impact of these reductions on the overall educational quality of the colleges. The colleges should describe how they intend to deal with any resulting negative impact.”
A brainstorming session was conducted and the committee identified highlights of work accomplished over the last year or two that sets BCC aside.
The committee discussed the low numbers in AA-T and AS-T degrees and the challenges faced with transferring students filing the petition due to the amount of time it takes to go through the process and the fact that they do not feel it is needed. It was suggested that issuing the degrees be automatic upon the completion of course requirements. It was stated that we also need to be mindful of how that may impact a student’s financial aid as we do not want it to have a negative impact.
Dr. Berry continued her review of the draft response pointing out that a lot more content will go into the Institutional Effectiveness piece. She is also waiting for additional charts and graphs for the Fiscal Capacity piece. She encouraged attendees to review the draft at their leisure.
Dr. Budd stated that if you were to read the information in the back of the report for Instruction and Students Services program there is a lot taken from the program review. Student Services and Instruction created a draft matrix, which Dr. May Chen and Dr. Berry walked attendees through.
Dr. Chen asked if information about Persist and Pace are part of the Program Review. Dr. Berry stated that she has the information and it will be added.
Cleavon Smith stated that a lot of really good information came from the floor todayand he suggested that we make sure we have mechanisms for capturing all the information/gaps that are in the process so we can come back to them. There is a concern that upon returning from break priorities will be made, without integrated conversation, as sometimes the conversations do not get completed. He also suggested putting “closing dates” on conversations rather than having ongoing discussion opportunities. This will help bring resolutions to some of the topics or at the least, identify next steps.
Dr. Budd expressed that information also be shared broadly in Academic Senate, Classified Senate, Student Government.
A suggestion was made to assign a “to do” to someone, even if they were to only come up with a plan that could be bounced around. This way, they are in the minutes and owned by someone to bring back information to future meetings.
The group identified task owners for the “Additions to Report” document and task owners will report back to the committee at a future meeting.
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Minutes taken by: Cynthia Reese, , 510.981.2851